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‘Filmmakers Unite,’ a series of shorts, takes on the Trump administration

Mick LaSalleOctober 2, 2018Updated: October 3, 2018, 6:46 pm

A scene from Sarah Clift’s “The Good Mother,” a short film featured in “Filmmakers Unite.” Photo: Jay Rosenblatt

“Filmmakers Unite” is an anthology film of shorts by independent filmmakers, made in response to the Trump administration. It was instigated by filmmakers Jay Rosenblatt and Ellen Bruno, who chose and arranged the short films from submissions sent from throughout North America.

The precedent for this film is the powerful “Underground Zero” (2002), which Rosenblatt and filmmaker Caveh Zahedi put together in the aftermath of 9/11. So just going in, the filmmakers’ implicit point is that the coming of Donald Trump is another American calamity of historical proportions. Indeed, for those filmmakers, that’s not just the point, but the accepted reality upon which their films are grounded.

The results are diverse and interesting, coming at the issue from a variety of angles. Particularly charming is the opening film, “The Good Mother,” by Sarah Clift, which, in its first seconds, convinces you that you are watching an especially earnest and deadly Mexican film: the long pauses, the somber sound track. But then you realize that this is a parody, linked to the story of a little boy who wants a Trump pinata for his birthday party and will accept no substitutes.

Rosenblatt’s own contribution, “Scared Very Scared,” is a compact masterpiece that addresses the anxiety that Trump evokes. He uses stock footage, mostly from mid-century training shorts, and overlays that with music and sound, achieving a complex effect that goes to the depths. The film is eerie, funny, unsettling and psychologically penetrating, often at the same time. To watch it is to marvel at how such a combination of disparate elements can produce such a pointed result.

Rosenblatt deals in the realm of the unconscious. His colleagues here deal mostly in the conscious realm. Pacho Velez and Nicole Salazar’s “The Starting Line” shows a Mexican border crossing, while people listen to Trump’s inauguration. “The Tool” is a nine-minute documentary about political cartoonist Mr. Fish. “Little Donnie” is a short horror movie, in which a Trump doll terrorizes a woman, Chuckie style.

Alan Berliner’s “State of the Union” shows a woman in an art gallery facing two canvases. On each is projected a succession of images, each in opposition to the other, emphasizing the polarities of American life. This flows beautifully into Eva Ilona Brzeski’s “Fellow American,” which shows the faces of various Americans, from throughout the country. The images are essentially portraits — just people looking into the camera — but we can usually infer the subjects’ political and philosophical leanings just by looking at them. The film becomes a contemplation of how people can be so far apart in their perception of reality. It also invites us to confront our own cultural assumptions.

There are other films contained here, all of them worth watching. Each has its own perspective, and all benefit from their connection to the whole. The cumulative effect is a sense of mystery, as though the movie were giving us random glimpses into a collective American consciousness — one that’s roiling and fearful, but retains seeds of its own renewal.

MFilmmakers Unite: An omnibus film about America in the Trump era. Compiled by Jay Rosenblatt and Ellen Bruno. (Unrated. 80 minutes.)